The following notice was put up at the General Post-office
on Wednesday.
" His Majesty's Postmaster-General having had satisfactory proof laid before him, that printed newspapers sent from the United Kingdom, addressed to the cities of Hamburg and Bremen, and the town of Cuxhaven, are allowed to pass by the post in those places free of postage ; and also that newspapers from those places, addressed to the United Kingdom, are allowed to pass free of postage, notice is hereby given, that under and by virtue of the authority contained in the 4th and 5th William IV. cap. 44, all Newspapers duly stamped and printed is the United Kingdom, will be received for conveyance by packet-boats to Hamburg, Bremen, and Cuxhaven' free of the duty of postage ; and that all Newspapers printed in Hamburg, Bremen, and Cuxhaven, and brought into the United Kingdom by packet-boats, will (if printed in the language of those States) be delivered by the General Post-office within the United Kingdom free
of the duty of postage. By command, F. FREELING, SOC."
The working of the late Act of Parliament is thus made appa- rent. All that is necessary to give Foreign Newspapers imme- diately a free circulation in this country, is to abolish the postage which foreigners levy on English newspapers abroad. There is no longer any fault to be found with our own Government on this score. We wish we could say the same of the French authorities, who have the power, but not the will, to reciprocate the liberality of this country. Our Paris correspondent" PETER" informs us, that the Courier's correspondent, who defended the French Govern- ment in this matter on the ground that a vote of the Legislature was necessary to enable them to alter the postage-law, was not so well-informed on the subject as the person whose statement he en- deavoured to neutralize. The fact is, that the French postage of ten sous, at praseut charged on British newspapers, was imposed, and may therefore be abolished, by a Royal Ordonnance. No—it is the fear of the independent English Press which stands in the way of a free circulation of our journals in France. Loins PHILI r dreads their censure. He can gag or ruin French journalists; but we are beyond his reach.
The Bishop of LONDON has thought fit to express his approba- tion of the Reverend Mr. GATHERCOLE'S Letters to a Dissenting Minister. It is to be hoped that his Lordship has never perused the work he has sanctioned; for, judging from the extracts pub- lished in the newspapers, it seems to be a most disgraceful publi- cation. The Dissenters are abused in it after this fashion-
" The principles of independency are indeed the principles of depraved human nature, Instilled into man and fostered in biro by his great enemy the Devil—the first Dissenter. . . Every Dissenter in choosing his ownteacher despised' and rejecteth God, in despising and rejecting his segularly-appointed miutesers, who are Ins representatives, acting is Ine Mame, and in virtuecfshe authority which he has committed to them through a medium of his own appointment. . . . hi short, 'the principles of Dissent,' or ludependency, influeuce every sou and daughter of Adam more or less, and are the source of all the evil of every kind on earth. Drunkenness, adultery, rubbery, and murder, and ,very species of iniquity mid vice, proceed from those in!;amal principles of licentiousness, for which Dissenting teachers contend under the specious names of liberty of con- science ' and Liberalism. I know that some do not allow their principles to carry them to such lengths ; but I also know that others do, and eonsistently so ton ; for some, alas ! too many, claim and take liberty of conscience sufficient to allow them to practise deceit, falsehood, cheating, rubbery, and even murder itself."
The man who could write such stuff as this, seems fit only for Bedlam : yet Dr. BLONFIELD applauds and is gratified with it! We have no very high opinion of the liberality of the Episcopal Bench ; but we do not believe there are two Prelates of the Church who would not be ashamed to sanction such ribaldry.
There are 1750 applications by Midshipmen of the Royal Navy to be appointed to the rank of Lieutenant.— Globe.
All professions are overstocked, but the officers of the Army and Navy appear to be in the mest hopeless predicament. The country has neither the.w ill nor the money to go to war, and of what use are soldiers and seatnen in time of peace? One of the motives to a redUction in the Military and Naval Estimates should be a desire. to prevent the ruin of thousands of the rising generation, who may he tempted to enter the Army or Navy, with little to do except flirt and fish,—for hunting and shooting are too expensive amuse- ments for the majority of the half-pay officers, who lodge in farm- houses for 15/. a year. Idleness, says the proverb, is the mother "of mischief; yet halt pay officers are too often condemned to idle- ness—lost to society, melancholy, dissipated, and worthless.
Previous page
